The story of the day coming into the game was the debut of the Braves’ top prospect Michael Harris. Despite the excitement, this was a tough matchup for Atlanta, with Tucker Davidson, who has not been good, facing off against the formidable Sandy Alcantara.
The early innings were mostly uneventful, with Davidson issuing a few walks, as has been a theme for him this season, but allowing no runs through three. Alcantara allowed one hit in each of the first two innings, and hit Acuna (apparently unintentionally) in the third, but also allowed no runs. Things unraveled a bit for Tucker in the fourth as he walked the first two batters and eventually allowed a run to come around on a sac fly. He did well to only allow one run though. Alcantara continued to cruise through the fifth inning, and Davidson allowed two singles, but escaped the fifth scoreless, despite the questionably decision to let him face the heart of the Marlins’ order the third time through. While he got through five innings with only one run allowed, Tucker is currently walking 7.63 per 9 innings and only striking out 5.87 per 9 this season, which is just a completely untenable approach long term.
Darren O’Day came in for the sixth and allowed a solo home run to Miguel Rojas, but nothing more. In the bottom of the sixth, Michael Harris made an impact, getting his first major league hit on a hard-hit line drive to the opposite field. Acuna singled to move Harris over to third and Harris scored on a Dansby groundout. Acuna advanced to third on the groundout and was called safe, but the Marlins challenged and the call was inexplicably overturned, despite there being no evidence that he was out on any angle the Braves broadcast showed.
FIRST MAJOR-LEAGUE HIT @MoneyyyMikeee is on the board. pic.twitter.com/E1QagSWtB3
— Bally Sports: Braves (@BravesOnBally) May 28, 2022
Collin McHugh came in for the seventh and got a groundout before allowing a bloop single and a walk to set the table for Garrett Cooper. Garrett Cooper did his “Garrett Cooper against the Braves” bit once again, and hit a two run double after going down 0-2 to make the score 4-1. Alcantara worked a 1-2-3 seventh with two strikeouts. Dylan Lee was the pitcher of choice for the eighth inning and he gave up a leadoff single but nothing else. Alcantara again worked a 1-2-3 inning in the eighth with two strikeouts again. Dylan Lee came back out for the ninth and completed his second inning scoreless.
Michael Harris was about a foot away from legging out an infield single in the ninth, but it was an out and Acuna struck out after working a full count. Dansby hit a two out double and Marcell Ozuna did well to work a walk to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of Austin Riley. Austin had frankly a pretty ugly at-bat and struck out to end the game.
Well that was not great, but the Braves still have a chance to win this series (which they really need to) behind Max Fried tomorrow at 1:35 PM ET.
Loading comments...